Tuesday, September 19, 2006

Only one column today, previewing "Smith," which actually grew on me on second viewing, but still not enough to give an unequivocal thumb up:

Bobby Stevens is ready to get out of the crime business. So he puts together an all-star team of thieves -- a brilliant marksman, a mistress of disguise and false documents, an electronics wizard, etc. -- to pull off the proverbial final big jobs before he can retire and live a respectable life with wife Hope and their kids. Bobby and his team have talent, they have inside information and they have a great plan -- and, of course, very little goes according to that plan.

"Smith" producer John Wells isn't looking to get out of the TV business anytime soon, but he's assembled an all-star team of his own, with Ray Liotta, Virginia Madsen, Simon Baker and Amy Smart heading arguably the most impressive new ensemble in a season full of them.

But, like his new anti-hero, Wells hits several bumps along the way.

There are traditionally two ways you can go with the heist genre, exemplified by last spring's generically titled and short-lived "Heist" on NBC and "Thief" on FX. "Thief" went the lightweight "Ocean's 11" route and tried to have fun with the mechanics of the heist, the quirks of the criminals, and so on. "Thief" went all Michael Mann on us: brooding, visually stylish, and focused more on the crooks' psyches than the science of how to crack a safe.

"Smith" struggles to work both sides of that street, resulting in a schizophrenic pilot that's more interesting in parts than as a whole.

3 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Oops. Confusing typo.

"Thief" went the lightweight "Ocean's 11" route and tried to have fun with the mechanics of the heist, the quirks of the criminals, and so on. "Thief" went all Michael Mann on us: brooding, visually stylish, and focused more on the crooks' psyches than the science of how to crack a safe.

While I share your choices for favorite scenes, I don't agree with your assessment of the show as a whole. I loved the deliberate pacing. When the heist started to go wrong, it really went wrong, and the tension was heightened because everything preceeding that had been so calm and minimalistic.

I loved the dialogue, or lack thereof. All of the relationships were illustrated perfectly in a few simple sentences, or a brief look between two characters. Instead of having the characters drop clunkers about the theft being perfect and nothing going wrong, the team just laid out the plan, carried out the job, and reacted as was necessary.

The only guy I wasn't interested in was the transport man, Joe. He's not developed enough for me. Well, none of them are that fleshed out after one episode, but he doesn't have enough of a personality.

I was surprised that the show didn't shy away from the fact that these guys are criminals. All of them exhibited the level of professional brutality necessary for that kind of work, and it was refreshing to see something less sugar-coated.

Hope's backstory got my attention. She's not the typical "conscience of the criminal" I expected her to be. And I loved that piano scene.

This is my favorite of the new pilots so far, and one I'll stick with for a while.